Methods for making mesostructured zeolites having long-range crystallinity, also described as full crystallinity, have been described. In accordance with such prior methods, a fully crystalline inorganic material is exposed to a pH controlled medium and a surfactant in the presence of a quantity of solution suitable to substantially suspend the zeolite in a solution. The zeolite suspension is put under time and temperature conditions to form a plurality of mesopores having a controlled cross sectional area within the fully crystalline inorganic material.
Equipment (e.g., processing vessels) that can be employed for producing mesostructures for commercial production (i.e., mass production) have limited capacity. Thus, scale up for commercial production of mesostructures can be limited by the quantity of solution required to make the transformation to a mesostructure from an inorganic material (i.e., the processing vessels have limited storage capacity). The success of mass production scale up of methods that suspend the zeolite in a quantity of solution is limited due, in part, to the quantity of solution. For example, the quantity of solution that suspends the inorganic material limits the amount of mesostructure that can be produced during production, by, for example, batch production processes. In accordance with the scale up of such methods, the quantity of mesostructured material that can be made is limited by the capacity of a vessel (e.g., a closed vessel A). For example, a quantity of solution that is necessary to substantially suspend the zeolite material limits the quantity of raw zeolite to be converted that will fit into the closed vessel A. In order to improve the production capacity, an increased factory size including larger vessels can be built, however, an increased factory size, the required time to build a new factory, and the associated costs are prohibitive. Thus, the potential economic viability of scaling up methods requiring suspension of the zeolite in a solution is limited.